After seven years of planning and several million dollars of public investment, the federal government has scrapped a project to build a national portrait gallery, Heritage Minister James Moore said late Friday.
The abrupt abandonment of the plan to build the gallery is the result of unstable economic times, said the minister. "In this time of global economic instability, it is important that the federal government continue to manage its own affairs prudently and pragmatically," he said in a press release.
Moore, who was appointed to the Heritage Ministry last month, also blamed the cancellation on a dearth of feasible submissions made by developers. "A number of developers submitted proposals to house the public programming and exhibitions of the Portrait Gallery of Canada," he said. "Unfortunately, none of these proposals met the government's requirements, and we are therefore terminating the selection process."
The cancellation comes a day after Moore, 32, told The Canadian Press that he hoped to "build bridges" with the arts community in his new posting. Relations with Canada's arts groups were strained after the Harper government announced $45 million in culture cuts earlier this year.
James Morton
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1 comment:
and here we go again. Why did Canadians re-elect them.. WHY???
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